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Men did not make the earth... It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property. ... Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds.

Thomas Paine

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Thomas Paine
Age: 72 †
Born: 1737
Born: January 29
Died: 1809
Died: June 8
Author
Entrepreneur
Journalist
Opinion Journalist
Philosopher
Politician
Prosaist
Writer
Thetford
Norfolk
Every
Ground
Make
Property
Proprietor
Men
Value
Improvements
Land
Owes
Community
Rent
Values
Holds
Individual
Libertarian
Earth
Improvement

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The sublime and the ridiculous are often so nearly related, that it is difficult to class them separately. One step above the sublime makes the ridiculous, and one step above the ridiculous makes the sublime again.
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To argue with a person who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead.
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Those who knew Benjamin Franklin will recollect that his mind was forever young, his temper ever serene science, that never grows gray, was always his mistress. He was never without an object, for when we cease to have an object, we become like an invalid in a hospital waiting for death.
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I believe in one God, and no more and I hope for happiness beyond this life. I believe in the equality of humans and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow creatures happy.
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...the true greatness of a nation is founded on principles of humanity.
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Reason obeys itself and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it.
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The idea of hereditary legislators is as inconsistent as that of hereditary judges, or hereditary juries and as absurd as an hereditary mathematician, or an hereditary wise man and as ridiculous as an hereditary poet-laureat.
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Those who expect to reap the blessing of freedom must undertake to support it.
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Every religion is good that teaches man to be good and I know of none that instructs him to be bad.
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The art of publicity is a black art but it has come to stay, and every year adds to its potency.
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How necessary it is at all times to watch against the attempted encroachment of power, and to prevent its running to excess.
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And as a man, who is attached to a prostitute, is unfitted to choose or judge of a wife, so any prepossession in favour of a rotten constitution of government will disable us from discerning a good one.
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It is painful to behold a man employing his talents to corrupt himself.
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To possess ourselves of a clear idea of what government is, or ought to be, we must trace it to its origin.
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Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence the palaces of kings are built on the ruins of the bowers of paradise.
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It is important that we should never lose sight of this distinction. We must not confuse the peoples with their governments.
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The danger to which the success of revolutions is most exposed, is that of attempting them before the principles on which they proceed, and the advantages to result from them, are sufficiently seen and understood.
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